Matamoras gun show patrons irked by proposed laws

After an unrelenting attack on what they say are their rights, gun people are firing back.

STEVE ISRAEL

After an unrelenting attack on what they say are their rights, gun people are firing back.

And what better place to do it than a gun show just across the border of New York State, which on Tuesday passed what Gov. Andrew Cuomo said would be "the most comprehensive (gun control) package in the nation." That law — combined with President Barack Obama's vow on Wednesday "to put everything I've got" into his proposed federal gun control laws — seemed to be one reason why thousands turned out Saturday, the first day of the two-day Matamoras Gun and Knife Show at the Best Western at Hunt's Landing. Hundreds waited in line to get in at 9 a.m. Many, if not most, who feared the gun control movement would infringe on their rights were from New York.

The predominantly male crowd aimed its ammunition at those who blame such recent mass shootings as the murder of 20 children and six adults in Connecticut on America's obsession with guns.

"We don't have a gun culture in America, we have a freedom culture," said show manager Nick Jubinski, who was doing a phone background check on a customer buying a pistol at a booth that sold everything from a vintage .44 caliber 1860 Colt handgun to smaller contemporary Rugers. "A gun is just a tool to maintain our freedom. If you're going to mess with that freedom, you're going to have bloodshed."

Others who packed the aisles with displays of everything from the semiautomatic Mossberg 715T rifle (illegal in New York) to a Winchester Model 12 shotgun blasted the politicians who voted for and crafted New York's law — many of whom used stronger language than Jim Knight of Port Jervis' "bull crap."

"They don't have the slightest idea what they're doing," said Bob Gay of Suffern, N.Y. "They don't even know what an assault weapon is."

He pointed to a rifle that was legal, except for its bayonet mount — one of the features that would make it a banned assault weapon.

"I mean, come on, what are we all going to do," said the hunter, "start stabbing everybody?"

Then, echoing what many at the show said, he added: "The Second Amendment is there so we can control the government, not so the government can control us."

The gun people also pointed to what they said is the flawed logic behind the gun control movement.

"It does nothing to stop the violence," said gun dealer John Tidd of Ariel, N.Y., who was selling that Mossberg 715T. "This isn't a gun issue; it's a mental health issue. This is typical liberal hysteria."

But many weren't just blasting the gun control law and the politicians behind it; they were vowing to fight it.

Gay hoped to mount a legal attack on the anti-gun legislation.

"We just have to sit back and not have a knee jerk reaction like Cuomo," he said, noting that his Rockland County, N.Y., gun club hired a lawyer to try to fight the law.

But others, like Stephen Carley of Dutchess County, N.Y., went one step further.

"I'm going to defy and not comply," said the man wearing a baseball cap that stated Second Amendment NRA Task Force. "If they come to my house for my guns, there's going to be a fight."